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Additional Evidence for Cannibalism in the Southwest: The Case of LA 4528

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  20 January 2017

Lynn Flinn ,
Christy G. Turner II  and
Alan Brew
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Abstract

About A.D. 950, 11 persons of a small Anasazi settlement on Burnt Mesa north of the San Juan River, New Mexico, were butchered, mutilated and possibly roasted. The group's mixed remains were left strewn over a pithouse floor. Nearly all the bones were smashed and splintered. Some of them were burned, some show cut marks, and all exhibit greenstick breaks. Cannibalism is the most reasonable explanation for the patterned destruction. Starvation or necessity, rather than ritual or religious configuration, seem to best explain why the cannibalism occurred.

Type
Reports
Information
American Antiquity , Volume 41 , Issue 3 , July 1976 , pp. 308 - 318
Copyright
Copyright © The Society for American Archaeology 1976

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